Legal Marijuana Market to Create Nearly 300,000 Jobs by 2020

Based on projected revenue growth, the legal U.S. cannabis market is expected to top $20 billion by 2020, more than triple its size in 2016. That makes the marijuana industry one of the fastest growing in the country. And as revenues rise, so does the number of jobs in the industry.

According to the 2017 Legal Marijuana Outlook published by New Frontier Data, the cannabis industry is expected to created 283,422 jobs by 2020. As many as 150,000 jobs have already been created in the industry, according to the 2016 Marijuana Business Factbook, so the implied growth rate is more than 17% compounded over the next four years.

The job growth and revenue estimates assume that every state will have a legal medical marijuana and adult use market in place and that there will be low barriers to entry, according to Giadha Aguirre De Carcer, CEO of New Frontier Data.

De Carcer said:

While we see a potential drop in total number of U.S. jobs created in 2017, as reported by Kiplinger, as well as an overall expected drop in GDP growth, the cannabis industry continues to be a positive contributing factor to growth at a time of potential decline. We expect the cannabis industry’s growth to be slowed down to some degree in the next 3 to 5 years, however with a projected total market sales to exceed $24 billion by 2025, and the possibility of almost 300,000 jobs by 2020, it remains a positive economic force in the U.S.

According to New Frontier Data, the legal cannabis market was worth an estimated $7.2 billion in 2016, and is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 17%, a decline from 28% CAGR in 2016. The medical market is projected to grow at 13% CAGR through 2025, growing from $4.7 billion in 2016 to an estimated $13.3 billion in 2020. During the same period, adult use sales are projected to grow at a 25% CAGR, from $2.6 billion to $11.2 billion (through projections based solely on the markets having passed medical and adult use legalization initiatives as of January 2017, but not including assumptions for additional states that may yet pass legalization measures before 2025).